So as my close friends know, and often those who aren't really interested, my brain has rarely stopped working. But today I had to have it tested, to make sure everything is still in place, and I haven't been invaded by any uninvited visitors. It was painless and quite colorful, the offices of the doctors being actually peacefulizing, still and featuring a travelogue about monuments narrated by a handsome white-haired Brit, I think he was, (the sound wasn't on) taking me through ancient tombs and places I've never been and some I have but nowhere I really want to go to anymore as the world has become too angry and unpredictable a place.
I had lunch afterwards at what used to be Lawry's, where I went in my long ago youth when Don was working on Carol Burnett's show. It is now something with Garlic in the title, most pleasant especially as I was with Shan Cretin, whose official title I forget as I forget a number of things these days, but she is high up in the Society of Friends, the Quakers I have loved since high school and
join from time to time when I covet peace. She is what you hope to find when you are looking for an inspirational human being, and assures me the violence that is going on now is actually less than when we were in caves, though today's weapons make it easier to make it fatal. Shan, as peaceful a person as has walked on the planet, I would be happy to wager, has been to jail for protesting war, arrested as Quakers are from time to time because this is a crazy world, as most of you know. Hopefully most of you have not been in trouble for your convictions, though I don't know many in this town who have them about a lot things besides success.
I do not leave myself out of that dispiriting number, but I almost believe I am getting better and hope I have shucked it off by the time I leave the planet. The other day I almost tracked Mel Brooks, once a very close friend, when I realized mid-search that I was no longer a teenager when I used to do such things, almost always with positive results, so quit. I still hope to catch up with him before one or the other of us exits, and I will never forget his and Annie (Bancroft, his wife,) driving me and Don back to the hospital (I had just given birth to Madeleine) opening night of my comedy on Broadway, The Best Laid Plans, an ill-chosen title if ever there was one, and Mel's saying "Well, you had two things happen this week. If one of them had to be less than perfect, if your daughter had been born with six toes or two noses, that would have been okay. What mattered was the show." I do believe he saved my life with that laugh.
This has been an uplifting period for me, possible brain problem notwithstanding, as I have entered more new realms than I realized existed, including becoming a comic strip. Now what I'd like to do is become a song. I have new baby friends, one of whom has a birthday this weekend so I am looking forward to being younger. So if I make it okay through all this, anything is possible, which I have always insisted anything is. But then, what do I know? Maybe they'll see in my brain.
